


21. summer solstice

by piggy09



Series: The Sestre Daily Drabble Project [193]
Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-08
Updated: 2017-01-08
Packaged: 2018-09-15 21:13:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9257483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piggy09/pseuds/piggy09
Summary: Helena and Sarah hang out and eat Popsicles. Basically nothing else happens.





	

**Author's Note:**

> [warning: reference to abuse]

“It’s hot,” Helena says.

“You’re not wrong,” Sarah says. Helena knows she isn’t. The heat is lazy sticky terrible, pawing at her hair and licking its wet way down her back. She wants to sleep for a thousand years. Instead they’re out here, eating Popsicles. Missus S doesn’t have air-conditioning in her house, so outside is almost a little bit less miserable than being inside. At least there’s a breeze. Sort of.

Helena holds the Popsicle over her tongue and watches a bright red drop of melted Popsicle make its slow way towards her tongue. Her brain is sludge.

“Wasn’t this bad in London,” Sarah says out of nowhere. The Popsicle drop hits Helena’s tongue at the same moment, so she doesn’t know if the sudden shock of red joy in her brain comes from the sugar or from Sarah telling her a story. (Sarah doesn’t like telling stories, much, but – when she tells them, she usually tells them to Helena. It makes Helena warm. Like she’s holding a glowing light between her palms.)

“S’d take us to do the – I don’t remember what it was called. Little boats, they were shaped like swans or somethin’. I’d always try to knock ‘em over. Dunno why she kept bringing us back over and over. Like this time it’d go different.”

“Did you ever knock them?” Helena says. Her tongue climbs out of her mouth, pokes the Popsicle. Cold. She pulls her tongue back in her mouth.

“Once,” Sarah says, and laughs. Helena rolls her eyes over in Sarah’s direction, watches Sarah bite off the end of her Popsicle and swallow it. “Water was _disgusting_ , all this shit in it. Literal, actual shit.” She laughs again. “Fee went absolutely mad. He’d gotten his hair to look nice and he was _pissed_ I’d ruined it.”

“It always looks nice.”

“Yeah, but he was six, he didn’t know what he was doin’.”

“Was your hair in braids?” Helena asks, trying to see it.

“No,” Sarah says. “They do that for you too? Why’d all of us have the bloody pigtails?”

“The nuns did it, sometimes,” Helena says. “Sometimes I would bite them too hard, and they would give up.” She laughs, low in the pit of her throat; the sound bubbles with artificial cherry-juice. She gives the Popsicle a big lick, all the way down the side. The world tastes red.

“S tried it once and I hit her and ran off,” Sarah says. “She didn’t try after that.” Another part of the Popsicle vanishes with a soft snap of teeth.

“In the summers,” Helena says, “I would go down to the basement. Very cold. Cold stones. Cold dirt. If the nuns found you down there they would scream and lock you away, so they never found me.” She holds a finger to her lips. “Shh.” Red drips on her finger, and she licks it off; then she licks the rest of the Popsicle, watches it dwindle.

“I like it better now,” she says, after a moment of considering. “Popsicles. _These_ , I like.”

“Gonna lose your mind when you see Fudgesicles,” Sarah says drowsily; when Helena looks over, her eyes are closed. Her Popsicle is about to drip on her face. Helena decides not to warn her about it. She licks at her own Popsicle instead, contemplatively.

“Are they Popsicles, but with chocolate,” she says.

“Can’t say, that’d ruin the surprise.”

“So yes.”

“So I can’t _say_ , meathead.”

“Yes,” Helena says smugly, “I solved the Fudgesicles," and she licks at her Popsicle again. You can almost see the riddle-answer through the remaining Popsicle, but she’s not in a hurry. She’ll read it when she reads it. No rush.

“Helena?” Sarah says.

“Yes, _sestra_?”

“I like it better now too.”

Sarah’s eyes are still close when Helena looks over. As she watches, a bright blue Popsicle-drip falls with a plop on her nose. Sarah’s eyes snap open and she looks cross-eyed at her nose; when Helena snorts, she looks over at Helena. Helena crosses her own eyes and Sarah looks back at her nose. Another drop of Popsicle lands on her cheek. “ _Shit_ ,” Sarah sighs, drawing the word out into a whine.

“Eat it faster.”

“Piss off, you don’t even know how to—” a drop lands on her chin. “ _shit!_ ”

Helena considers saying _yes, I know how to do that,_ but she doesn’t. Instead she just laughs, watches Sarah try and lick the bright blue juice off her chin and fail miserably. It’s a good day. It’s a good life. Helena puts her tongue to that red again, and waits to find out the answer.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please kudos + comment if you enjoyed! :)


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